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Politics : High Tolerance Plasticity -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: kodiak_bull who wrote (15196)	7/17/2002 2:02:16 PM
From: pvz	Respond to of 23153

KB, you could be right. I had noticed how quiet it had been hereabouts since his serial spamming all over SI the other day, and assumed the SI police might have zapped him. pvz

To: kodiak_bull who wrote (15196)	7/17/2002 7:04:47 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 23153

The meltdown of corporate America Editorial i-street.com July 17, 2002 i-street.com The dot-com and telecom implosions are going to look like a tiny blip on the radar screen compared to what's happening in corporate America. Turns out Enron wasn't a fluke but rather an oracle to the mudslide of greed and corporate duplicity consuming our country. More powerful than a terrorist attack, company after company-many of which we believed were the pillars of American capitalism-have fallen prey to their own criminal acts. Creative accounting, insider trading, obstruction of justice and fraud scream in the headlines of companies like Enron, Global Crossing, Andersen, ImClone, WorldCom, Vivendi... and now it seems EDS. Wall Street and the world are watching jobs and billions of dollars evaporate overnight, and in many cases, life savings and pension plans. Can we stop corporate crime before it happens? Isn't that supposed to be one of the major roles of the Securities and Exchange Commission? Steven Spielberg introduces the world to the Department of Pre-Crime in the current blockbuster movie, "The Minority Report." In addition to the chilling picture of biometrics and security gone amok in a world where technology in the hands of the government is used to strip society of its right to privacy, viewers are asked to consider the philosophical issues of stopping crime that is destined to happen, but before it does happen. Is crime destined to happen in corporate America? Patrick Murphy, Director of the Institute for Ethical Business Worldwide at Notre Dame and a teacher for a Chicago Executive MBA program, describes a roller coaster that some companies can't quite get off of. "These companies get on this stock price growth and they are willing to virtually do anything to keep that going. That's where unethical behavior leads to illegal behavior and we end up with the scandals that we've had in the last few months. And frankly, I think the accounting firms have to take their jobs more seriously," said Murphy, adding "And in the technology sector, I think the competition is one of the things to blame." Maybe we need the SEC to develop a department of pre-crime. It shouldn't be that difficult to build a psychological profile of a future corporate criminal because we have so many distinguished role models. He is probably white, 40-54, grew up in a poor neighborhood and went to a third-tier college but surrounds himself with Harvard graduates, his "wife has expensive tastes justifying a $55 million annual salary" even though his company is hemorrhaging cash and market share, his company has huge losses in its equity portfolio that are disguised with derivatives, he takes company loans, he has an enormous sense of entitlement and refers to most of his staff as plebes, he simply loves being filthy rich at anyone's expense and loves to be considered a 'thought leader.' Hey, we can already think of 10 CEOs who are on the path of pre-crime. In the Minority Report, the undoing of the Department of Pre-Crime was the awareness that people have a choice. Corporate America has a choice too and we have a choice. The SEC needs to wakeup---they never should have allowed Andersen to operate as a criminal firm for at least eight years prior to Enron. Many community members criticized Crain's, the Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune for their coverage of Andersen; we think they deserve the gold badge of honor. We need stronger laws giving shareholders detailed access to "immaterial" accounting information. In the meantime, get on every conference call, attend every public shareholder meeting, contact investor relations and ask the tough questions. Our future may depend on it.